


Thy Perfect Light

by Natashasolten



Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: M/M, Winter Solstice, Yule, holiday fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-24
Updated: 2016-12-24
Packaged: 2018-09-11 13:40:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8982223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Natashasolten/pseuds/Natashasolten
Summary: The newly married kings spend the winter Solstice in Akielos. Damen has a little trouble with his winter eve gift for Laurent, but it all works out in the end.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I could not resist writing a Pagan-ish story for the holidays about "Captive Prince". Here you will find a simple tale about gift giving. I borrowed shamelessly from ancient Greek and Norse traditions to create the winter holidays of Vere and Akielos. While I love that there is no religion mentioned in "Captive Prince," I still decided to title my story from a line from the carol "We Three Kings". Happy Holidays!

Akielons called the darkest winter month Poseideon. On the Solstice, they celebrated Haloea. Adults were given little cakes and candies shaped like sexual organs. Men built great pyres on the beach in the cold outdoors, and drank to excess.

In Vere, Yule hailed the beginning of the winter season in the month they called Ylir. In honor of the rebirth of the Great Horned Hunter, tales were told of the Wild Hunt, a ghostly band of witches, sprites, elves and fairies who flew across the skies of the longest nights of the year looking for fresh souls to capture.

The traditions of both countries included merriment and feasting, candle-lighting ceremonies and bonfires to ward against the druagar (dead bodies coming back to life to wreck havoc on unsuspecting villages), as well as gift exchanges between loved ones.

King Laurent called it all “a ridiculous excess,” but only in private because his people, and Damen’s, loved these holidays, and after everything the two kingdoms had been through at the hands of Kastor and Vere’s Regent, they had all earned some time off.

The new kings of Vere and Akielos had only recently married. The novelty of that was still settling over the townships and domains of both countries. Skirmishes had broken out here and there, small uprisings. But nothing their combined armies could not handle. In order to encourage the new bonding of their two cultures, both Kings Damianos and Laurent insisted upon an equal representation of the traditions of Haloea and Yule. They called for a nations-wide peace.

As winter approached, it made sense for the dual kings to remain in Akielos. The wild seas were not fit to travel this time of year, and journeys by land were equally dangerous due to storms and blizzards. They agreed to winter in Akielos, and promised to spend the holiday in Vere the following year.

Now the palace at Ios glittered and glowed against the white cliffs overlooking a black and wintry ocean. To honor Veretian tradition, candles burned night and day in every window. Evergreen boughs decorated hearth and hall. The Akielon rites consisted of lavish feasts, overflowing caskets of wine, and great wooden structures built on the dark beaches that would be lit all at once on the Solstice, the longest night of the year.

Akielon children quickly learned to look to the skies to try to catch glimpses of the Wild Hunt. Veretian youths enjoyed the new ritual of receiving socks full of candy.

All looked forward to their Solstice day gifts.

 

*

 

Two weeks before the longest night, Laurent reclined in bed, reading. He lay in what Damen could only think of as golden splendor against a gilt, brocaded pillow. The wispy bed curtains were drawn back by soft, thick ropes. A red sheet covered Laurent to the waist, and the candlelight sent wavering, copper shadows over his smooth, lean-muscled chest and arms.

Even in the cold of fall, Laurent always looked sun-struck. His pale hair picked up light in the dimmest surroundings. His wide blue stare hid little from Damen anymore. Now that Damen knew the ice prince intimately, those eyes revealed everything to him: fine wit, quick intelligence, keen observation, and a focused depth of sensitivity others too easily missed simply because they did not bother to look beyond the blooming beauty that Veretian royalty had bred.

Now, from their bed, that gaze sought Damen, and he knew Laurent was not really reading.

Damen sat at a round, wooden table about ten feet away, quill in hand, parchment unrolled before him. He could feel Laurent’s secret gaze like a brand, like a candle flame running all over his skin.

He looked at the parchment, trying to focus, but Laurent was making it damned hard. He didn’t dare look at him, or he wouldn’t finish what he’d started, and he wanted to do two more lines at least before retiring for the night.

Heavily painted words blurred before him. His own hand, more artistic than was characteristic for him, looked dark and flowing with curlicues in all the right places, and beautiful flourishes.

Every once in awhile he turned his head slightly and saw in his peripheral vision Laurent watching him while pretending to read.

Damen smiled and bent his head forward, scrunching his eyebrows together, trying to focus.

Finally, he heard Laurent’s voice say quietly, “Whatever it is you’re doing over there, it must be important.”

Damen cleared his throat. “It is.”

“Do you need help?”

“No.”

“Good, because I hate being interrupted from my nightly reading.”

Damen smiled without looking up. “I know you do.”

“And I’m not getting up even if you desperately require me to look over those documents.”

“If I needed your help, I would bring them to you, of course,” replied Damen.

“That I would not allow. Remember our rule? No politics in bed.”

“I am aware of the rule,” said Damen.

“Good.”

“Yes.” Damen closed his eyes, trying to concentrate. “It is a good rule.” He opened his eyes and stared at the letters again. _Like a horse’s mane, your hair. My cantering heart._

He winced.

Laurent said, “But, I wonder, does the rule stand if you ask me questions from across the room while I am in bed and you are not?”

Damen bit his lip in frustration. “Yes. The rule still stands.”

“Then does it also stand that I am not allowed to ask you questions, though my questions are aimed away from the bed?”

Damen said, “Yes. And that was a question.”

“Not about politics.”

Damen stared at more of his words. _Candle-lit air, scent of oranges and wine…_

“It was literally a question about questions,” Laurent continued.

Damen frowned.

Softer, “Damen…”

“Just a moment.” He pressed his palm to his forehead. Wrote the Veretian word for _sword._ “Make a list,” the scribe had told him. “Start simple. Your favorite things.” But everything felt clunky and wrong.  He crossed it out. His desperate scratching messed up the parchment but he didn’t care. He could re-copy it later.

“Damen.”

He wrote the Veretian word for _brother_ and then realized what he’d done and a horror swept through his chest. He scratched at it so hard he made a dent in the papyrus. He let out a low noise of frustration.

“Damen, what’s so important?”

“Nothing.” In the distance, the sea crashed against itself. Night swept in on dark wings, but their room and hearth held them cocooned in incandescence and warmth. Damen put a hand through his hair and pulled. He muttered, “Just realizing I’ve been wasting my time.”

“What?” Laurent asked.

Damen did not have to look his way to read the expression of annoyance and confusion that would no doubt be showing on Laurent’s face. He got up, crumpling the long parchment ends together, and headed to the fire. When he stood in front of the hearth, he threw the papyrus upon it, watching the edges turn orange, smelling the sudden scent of its sweet resins as it burned.

He expected another Laurent-comment, but only silence came from the direction of the bed.

Damen turned, trying not to look too chagrined, and approached the table, putting out the candles with a pinch of his fingers. When he looked up, Laurent was not watching him anymore. He was staring at his book, turning a page, pretending he hadn’t just seen Damen destroy the document he’d been working on. The document that had made him ignore his lover for far too long tonight.

Damen approached the bed, looking down.

Laurent turned another page before finally glancing up. The edges of his mouth curled slightly. “Are you done?” His tone remained quiet, without inflection, but the planes of his face were soft, relaxed, and his eyes held no accusations, only a sweetness with the lids wide open, wondering.

“For tonight,” said Damen.

“It would appear so. Unless you are very good at reading ashes.”

Damen reached out to touch the side of Laurent’s head.

Laurent pretended not to notice, and turned his head away, putting the book on the shelf over his head. “Good. That book was becoming boring anyway.”

Damen bent his knees, pressing them into the side of the bed, bringing himself closer to Laurent’s side. He wore winter clothing, but he could feel the smooth sheets against the cloth at his knees.

The bed looked like a decadent nest, all reds and blacks and brocade, with white furs at the foot to pull up when the night grew coldest just before the dawn, and the hearth fires burned low, and they wound themselves tighter around each other, sleeping in each other’s embrace. “I’m sorry. I’ll make sure you are stocked with better books in the coming long evenings.”

“No need,” Laurent replied, looking at him askance. “I have other things to occupy me in bed these days.”

“Really?” Damen suppressed a grin.

“That is,” Laurent continued, going for a more petulant tone, “if my husband cares to tear himself away from his work long enough to join me.”

“The nights are long these days,” Damen replied. “We are in no rush, are we?”

“No.  But quality of time is not everything. Quantity of time counts, too.”

Damen suppressed a pleased smile. “Are you saying I do not spend enough time with you?”

Laurent shrugged.

“We are in each other’s company almost always these days.”

“Yes. And it is never…” Laurent took a short breath and lowered his eyes. “…ever enough.”

Damen saw Laurent’s hands gripping the red sheets as if suddenly tense. The hearth made flickering patterns of elongated, almost-human shapes on the walls. _The Wild Hunt,_ Damen thought, amused. _How’d it get in here?_

He glanced over his shoulder, but they were alone. There were no ghosts between them or surrounding them. Not anymore. The only person in the room with him now was his lover, soul twin to his own, and for a moment he could not breathe.

And Laurent had just said he could not get enough of Damen. He could not have asked for a sweeter admission of love.

Damen reached up and unfastened the clasp of his heavy muslin winter shirt, pulling it over his head. Soon his drawstring trousers followed, dropping to the smooth, cold floor.

Laurent gave a small gasp, glancing away as he moved down in the bed and lifted the covers for Damen to join him.

Damen loved hearing that fast, indrawn breath, Laurent’s hard-fought response whenever he looked at Damen, clothed or nude, but most especially nude. He watched in the remaining candlelight as Laurent’s skin pinked, as his body came alive in an almost imperceptible tremble. The sapphire eyes darkened, the gaze turning languid and heavy. Full pink lips parted.

Damen scooted under the red sheet and reached for him. Before he could complete his embrace, Laurent rolled effortlessly onto him, fitting himself into his arms, pressing his entire length along Damen’s flank, hip, abdomen and chest. He had been waiting awhile, Damen realized, for the Veretian king was already naked, no sleep pants to remove, nothing, just skin against skin.

Laurent curved his head under Damen’s chin and pushed his hands under Damen’s arms, pulling him tightly to him.

Staying still for a moment, Damen allowed himself to feel the warm, lithe body against his own, basking in the wave of hot arousal that washed over him, shivering down his spine and into his legs. The heat fluttered in his stomach, culminating in a growing hardness between his legs.

Laurent lifted his head, the golden shimmer of hair brushing over his face, and kissed Damen gently on the mouth.

Taste of summer.  Liquid sun. A drop of sea. A hint of drowsy woodlands. And a peppering of library dust. Damen thought, _I must remember these images._

But too soon he was lost. Laurent’s mouth fed him an elixir like wine but stronger, so strong his mind whirled, and stars were born and wheeled away all during the length of a simple caress. Damen’s skin pulsed with fever, veins flooded with the burn and sweet lick of passion, soft and comforting, wild and abandoned at the same time.

Their bodies pressed to one another, fitting perfectly, rolling, turning, meeting, spreading as if they were one mind.

They took turns pushing each other over, exploring with hands and tongue. Damen loved tasting every aspect of Laurent, but mostly he loved his mouth and lips, and his eyes, and that other favorite spot where his hands caressed first the long, smooth inner thighs, then the hard core, the center where the thighs ended, where the prize of pleasure rose strong and pink and perfect.

Slowly, he lowered himself in the bed and fed on Laurent’s cock with a hunger he had never known with another lover.

Laurent, no longer shy or afraid of giving up control, bucked into his mouth. Some nights Laurent cried out and pulled away, not from awkwardness or fear anymore, but because he did not want to finish too soon.

But tonight Laurent let him have him that way until the golden ice prince arched and moaned, helplessly spurting, filling Damen’s mouth with tart-salt liquid. Damen drank greedily, honored, thrilled, and always amazed.

It didn’t matter that Laurent had spilled so soon. Laurent had energy tonight, boundless, insatiable, undeniably delighted. Damen licked up his stomach to his neck, and kissed him long and hard again, lost in the honeyed perfumes of him, and the tastes of such nectars that could not be named but only felt by those who knew the truth of what it was to fall, besotted and uncontrolled, in love.

After a minute of tongues entwined and lips pulling, Laurent pushed Damen onto his back and began his own journey. Laurent’s travels were always well-planned and thorough, and he liked to explore every puckering, every crevasse, and all the firm, hard ridges of the planes of Damen’s chest, abdomen, hips. When Laurent knelt between his knees, Damen saw Laurent was aroused again, that rosy, precious cock rising strong, unchecked, uninhibited. Laurent had come a long way from their first night, a wonder and glory Damen would never forget, but still a night when Laurent had been so pushily green as if he’d had something to prove, and something to hide. Which, to be fair on both counts, he had.

To this day, Damen regretted telling Laurent that he’d fucked like a virgin, for Laurent had taken it as an insult, and Damen had been ashamed, for in Akielos virgins were a precious commodity, honored and revered.

How angry with each other they’d been that day after Damen had taken Charcy. How lost in mistrust. The day had been so full of killing and perceived betrayals, neither could see clearly for awhile.

Now Laurent took Damen’s cock reverently between his lips, teasing with his tongue.

The heat in Damen became a blaze.

For a long while, Laurent teased him just enough to make him crazy drunk on the pleasure, but never quite allowing him to fall over the edge. They both loved it.

Now Laurent’s fingers traveled beneath him, exploring further. Damen lifted up and felt himself thrust deeper into Laurent’s mouth. Fingers damp with oil penetrated Damen with soft, lingering caresses inside and out.

Laurent moved off Damen’s cock and pushed him further up in the bed. Damen bent his knees just as he felt the larger intrusion. It was easier now. The first time? Not so much, as Damen had wrestled with the idea that he mostly liked being on top, and wasn’t sure about the other way around.

But now it was effortless. Laurent fucked so sweetly Damen often begged for it. They traded like this back and forth. Top/bottom. Bottom/top. Not every night, of course. Some nights were for slow caresses and completion like the sun melting into the sea, and other nights were for wild fucking, like mountain winds whipped into a frenzy.

Now Laurent moved back and forth, his hand on Damen’s cock, and lowered his head to Damen’s until their foreheads touched.

Damen grabbed him close, wanting him deeper, faster.

When Laurent’s cock touched that sweet spot deep inside, he felt caught by surprise even though he knew it was coming. His body jerked. Laurent’s hand stilled on Damen’s cock, squeezing slightly as Damen throbbed his essence onto his own stomach over and over. Laurent chuckled, kissing him again, pressing deeper inside him. Laurent twisted his body a bit and moved back and forth, gliding for some minutes in a lethargic fucking that kept Damen half-hard, and Laurent at the ready.

They were in no rush. These long nights let them make love two, three…even four times a night if they so wished, with plenty of time after for the comas of satiation to overtake them.

After a dreamy span of warmth and kisses, Laurent tensed and came, his second orgasm that night, this time deep inside the recesses of Damen’s body.

Damen turned his head aside and whispered, “How did I ever exist before you?”

Breath a wisp against Damen’s ear, Laurent replied, “It is a mystery.”

 

*

 

The white-haired scribe said to Damen, “Exalted, if you want to learn to write your thoughts and make a gift of them to your husband, you must learn to trust what you feel and not think too much. You must be as you are with your lover in bed as you compose. It is a dance.”

Damen’s face heated. But he remained silent.

They met almost daily in the scribe’s parlor in the east wing of the palace. It was late afternoon, the only time Damen could get away for a half an hour.

The shadows were lengthening. The sea had become stormy again, bashing itself against rocks and sand and he could hear it, along with the winds, like a howling, or a grieving mob, or perhaps the immortal dead riding the sky looking for souls.

The candles were half-burnt here in the scribe’s room. Beeswax sweetly sifted the air. The quietude should have helped to relax him.

Damen took a deep breath, eyes closing half-way. “I tried writing while drunk and that did not work.”

The scribe smiled. “Maybe you were too drunk. But letting yourself go is key. Make a list of his attributes, colors, scents, and more. Do not try to over complicate it. Do not try to make a story. Just one sentence can be a poem. You are not here to learn to become an epic poet.”

“Certainly not,” Damen replied. “I want only ten pages. A book of my words as a gift. That is all. Why is it so hard?”

“You are unbeatable with the sword. But did you get that way over night? No. You practiced every day for years. The pen is like the sword. You practice. Your mind can get in your way. It is this way in fighting, too, am I right?”

Damen nodded, remembering that his instructors told him if he thought too hard, or fought with too much pre-planning, too much thinking, he would become slow and predictable. His power was not in question, but the creativity and speed with which he fought came from an inner place, a trusted instinct that led him.

“I must complete this as best I can by the Solstice.” He frowned at the scribe. “For the man who has everything, what other gift could I give him? It has to work. Even if my words are bad, or silly, I will complete this.”

“That’s the attitude. Ten pages, you say?”

Damen nodded.

“Ten poems. Short, long. One line. Two lines. We will make this work. He will like the gift because it comes from you.”

Damen almost flushed to think about it. Why was he embarrassed? Laurent and he shared everything. He trusted Laurent. There was no need to be embarrassed. He would give what he had to give, and that would be it. Laurent would not love him any less for it, even if his poems might be worse than the game-chants of children.

Still, he felt his heart twist up inside him and his brain shut down. Words. He was not stupid. He could speak three languages quite well, using voice and words to rule the throne room as he was born to do. Why, then, was it so hard to write his thoughts?

As if reading his mind, the scribe said, “You care deeply. That is why it is so hard. But you can find the will and the way. And even if your words are not perfect, he will see the time you took for this, and that will be worth something.”

Damen nodded.

The scribe added, “King Laurent is known for his hardness, his ice-coating. He is firm and unbending in many ways. Cool. Detached. But Exalted, if I may be so bold, I have seen the two of you together, and he is that way with everyone…except you.”

He spent fifteen more minutes with the scribe that day. He wrote a line or two about the sea and Laurent’s eyes, but could pull nothing more from his white-hot mind.

Still, he determined to see the scribe the next afternoon, and the next, and then write in the evenings until he had accomplished what he set out to do, make a Solstice gift unlike any Laurent had ever received.

 

*

 

Laurent, for all his leanness and his willowy frame, was far from soft. He’d proven that to Damen the day he had effortlessly bested Govart at the sword.

He still practiced the sword every day, undeterred. Sometimes Damen practiced with him, or watched with pride and gave occasional, gentle instruction, which Laurent took without comment.

Since wrecking the practice arena at Marlas, they’d never again sparred with each other. It went unspoken between them. If they happened, in practice with others, to accidentally face each other during a turn or a lunge, their muscles and sinews froze. They had each become strangely incapable of raising a weapon to the other.

Damen arrived at the practice arena after his meeting with the scribe. Today he decided to watch, not play. He sat on a wooden bench by a wall of swords as Laurent, alone today, and wearing a loose white shirt and dark blue trousers, practiced a routine Damen had seen a hundred times now, but never tired of watching.

Laurent’s hair was tied in a black ribbon that trailed to the center of his back, the ribbon longer on one side than the other and adoringly unkempt. A strand of blond kept brushing his eyes, but he ignored it, as professionals did, focused only on his steps, his arm motions, his balance. He was like a dancer the way he moved. Most men who fought strong and sure still resembled ramming bulls. They’d get the job done in war and battle, but there was no grace in it. But with Laurent… To think of battle like a dance seemed wrong to Damen. It involved far too much blood and death for him to use words like grace and dance to describe it, and yet that was how Laurent defeated competitors, with an elegance and refinement that shifted boundaries and definitions. Laurent never played by the rules. In that regard, he was the true artist, the genius who had gone so long ignored in the court of Vere until Damen had come along.

The visit to the palace scribe had made Damen frustrated. Now he watched Laurent move on the sawdust with the wintry, Akielon light casting everything in silver tones, and all his tension slipped away.

The sleeve of Laurent’s shirt was loose, white against the pale gold skin of his forearm, the slave cuff flashing. The shirt was undone as well at the throat, the strings waving, revealing the flat upper part of his chest, the skin pink at the center edging to gold toward his shoulders. His legs, bent slightly at the knees, turned, kicked, stepped, giving him superior balance and coordination. Damen watched him like a swordsman, admiring the assuredness of his stature, but more, he watched him like a lover, seeing the slick glint of sweat at his temples, the flicker of the lanterns in his uncompromising eyes, the set of his mouth, the full lips pressed tight, determined. His narrow waist where the shirt was tucked, twisted as he lunged. He moved his arms up, back, forward. He lifted on his toes and for a moment Damen swore he floated, as if he were winged. Laurent, winged. Now that was an image! He could lead the Wild Hunt himself and be a natural at the task.

All these thoughts and observations swam in Damen’s head. Why then, when he tried to get them onto paper, did he freeze? He could not find the necessary elegance, the essence of what he saw, the gush of what he felt to reside in letters, words and curlicues on parchment.

And yet it was all there. Right in front of him. Everything about Laurent made him feel alive and vibrant. There simply were no words to adequately convey it. But he wanted the words so badly. He wanted his gift to Laurent to be words. He wanted it not for himself, but for his husband who loved poetry, analysis, books. He wanted this for the young king who loved to read.

One more week until Solstice. Until Yule. Until Haloea.

He watched Laurent swim through the arena, blade flashing, body and hair afire in a perfect light. Laurent was the most beautiful being he’d ever seen.

Damen determined he would capture it in words.

 

*

 

Winter’s hand touched Akielos with cold days and even colder nights, but rarely left behind the caress of snow.

But the day before Solstice, the flakes began to come down. Lazy white feathers covered the earth with their down. The ocean rippled with silver glitter today, undulating but not too wild. The beach looked like a moonland.

Damen found Laurent on the balcony, his dark blue cloak dusted with ice, and when he turned there were snowflakes on his eyelashes and in his hair.

“Did you bring the snow with you from Vere, perhaps?” Damen asked.

“It’s that rare here?”

Damen shrugged. “It snows maybe once every three or four years. Rarely sticks except up on the hills beyond the city.”

They could hear the delighted shouts of children beyond the palace walls, running and playing in the gentle, icy storm.

Damen and Laurent’s breaths made little puffs of white clouds on the air.

“I know it’s a hardship for many, but I always loved the snow,” Laurent said, his voice like a soft echo of the pure and beautiful season.

“I look forward to wintering in Vere next year,” said Damen.

Laurent took a deep breath. He smacked his chest with his palm. “Ah, so cold!”

“Would you like to go in to the fire?”

“Just one more minute.” His exclamation, Damen decided, had not been to complain about the cold, but to express his love for it.

Damen had forgotten his cloak, but he stayed outside at Laurent’s side dressed only in his white long-sleeved pull-over, belted at the waist, with nothing underneath but lightweight trousers. The cold surrounded him.

They looked out over the garden paths and retreats, and off toward the buildings that housed the practice arena, storage sheds and barns, and a large, ornate bathhouse built for those who served the kings. Beyond all that stood the orange and olive groves, and the tropical gardens, all leading to a distant wall at the white cliffs and, beyond that, the sea. From their king’s rooms, they had a view like none other.

Damen remembered his father had loved this view and often took meals on the private deck in spring and summer.

After another few minutes, Laurent swiveled to look at him, his eyebrows slightly narrowed, slightly teasing. “I think I’ve had my fill.”

Damen turned to the double doors and entered. He felt Laurent’s hand on his lower back. “Aren’t you freezing?”

“No,” Damen lied. In truth, he felt cold to the bone, but too happy to care. Whenever he was with Laurent, nothing seemed to hurt him anymore. Even when he had been healing from the stab wound he’d received from Kastor, he had felt little pain. This was, he had decided, because Laurent had rarely left his side during his recovery. They had overcome such impossible odds in winning back their countries and thrones, it seemed there wasn’t much they could not achieve together. In light of that, even the pain of a fairly serious stab-wound was nothing to him.

Laurent’s hand rubbed quickly up and down his back, warming him. “You feel cold,” he commented.

They walked together toward the hearth where furs awaited them. A casual evening meal of meats, cheeses and dried fruits was laid out on a low table. A pitcher of water and a pitcher of wine sat beside four empty chalices. There were also little iced cakes, mostly meant as treats for the women, but the men ate them, too. Laurent chuckled when Damen picked up a penis-shaped one, saying, “It’s a little small.” But before Laurent could comment, he popped the entire cake into his mouth. He chewed, closing his eyes. “Hmm, it’s quite tasty. These were my favorites when I was a kid, before I even knew what they were meant to represent. I thought they were swords until I was fourteen or so.”

“I can’t wait to introduce them to Vere next year,” Laurent said, lifting his eyebrows and rolling his eyes at the same time.

Damen sat but Laurent stayed standing. He watched as Laurent approached the bigger table behind their couch to ruffle the papers there. “What is it you’ve been working on so often lately?” he asked.

Damen sat very still, saying nothing. He wasn’t worried. Laurent would find no evidence of his deeds on the table. He’d hidden his work away in a cubby in a chest of drawers, increasingly unsatisfied, but still trying to capture words and images he could share. He had one more day to finish his project, his gift to Laurent, and get the book sewn. He would give him scribbles and notes if he had to. It would not matter to Laurent, he knew, even though it mattered very much to Damen. He only wished he could be more of a man of letters.

Laurent continued to search through the papers on their shared, round makeshift desk. He commented now and again on something he’d thought was completed but was not, or things that needed Damen’s signature that Damen had forgotten about. Finally, he turned. “There’s nothing here that would keep all your attention.”

“No,” Damen replied.

“Then, what have you been doing?”

Damen grabbed a hunk of bread and cheese and leaned back into the furs of the couch. “I’ll tell you tomorrow.” He winced. It was stupid, but the heat of renewed embarrassment ran through him. “I promise.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Yes. It’s stupid. Very stupid. But you’ll have to wait until then.”

Silently, Laurent came around the couch, watching him. He took his cloak off with a swirl. Underneath, he wore clothing much the same as Damen’s, a long-sleeved shirt belted at the waist, dark trousers, soft furred boots. When he sat, he was very close to Damen. Their thighs and shoulders touched. He laid an uncharacteristic hand on Damen’s thigh. “I look forward to tomorrow, then.”

Damen only winced harder. “It’s not really working out, but all I can say is that tomorrow you’ll know.”

Laurent’s eyes were soft blue as Damen turned to meet his gaze. “I look forward to tomorrow, then.” He squeezed his hand gently against Damen’s leg.

“It’s not really much to look forward to, I assure you, but—“ He let his voice trail.

Laurent’s gaze remained steady, studying him openly. Damen began to feel a different heat, the embarrassment fading. “Are you really all that hungry” Laurent asked.

Damen looked at the bread in his hand and shook his head.

“I have an idea,” he heard Laurent say. His lover moved away from him and Damen opened his eyes to see him reaching for the plate of cakes. Laurent looked over his shoulder as he rose, taking the plate with him. “Let’s just take the cakes to bed. We’ll eat them there.”

Damen rose with him. “It’s early yet.”

“So?”

They both sat on the bed, still clothed, the plate of erotic cakes between them. Laurent turned and placed his hand along Damen’s cheek, cupping his jaw. He leaned forward and kissed him, lips still damp with snow, giving Damen a taste of silvery Veretian winters melting on the tongue of Eros.

Soon, the plate was forgotten, kicked to the foot of the bed.

 

*

 

The scribe, his long gray hair held back with the jeweled pin Damen had paid him with when they first started the poetry lessons, met Damen in an alcove the afternoon before the Solstice feast. He handed Damen a white, cloth-wrapped package. Square. Not heavy. It was soft and yielding in his hand.

“The gold thread you asked for was used in the binding.”

“Thank you,” Damen said.

“It will make a fine gift.” The scribe smiled. Damen could not decide if the smile was genuine, or slightly condescending. He knew his words, contained within the book, were not good. He knew it without a doubt. But he was determined to see this through.

Damen paid the man a pouch of coins as a tip, with a few more thrown in as an extra Haloea gift. “Never a word to anyone about this,” Damen said.

“The secret of your writings is safe,” the scribe replied. His smile widened.

Damen took a deep breath and turned away.

The halls were lit with more lamps and candles than usual, decorated with garlands of green, ornamented with cloth flowers made by the children of the palace and the surrounding village.

Before going to the great hall, Damen detoured to the king’s rooms and darted inside, placing his gift on Laurent’s pillow, then stood back and looked at it. He wanted to admire it, but could not quell the disappointment he felt. Still, giving this gift was the right thing to do. This Haloea/Yule present was all he had for His Majesty Laurent of Vere, a man who could have anything he wanted. The man who had chosen Damen.

 

*

 

When Damen arrived at the hall, he was only slightly late. He wore his best long red cloak fastened at the shoulders, and a leather vest over a loose, long-sleeved shirt. The edges of his shirt were trimmed in gilt, catching the light. His trousers were dark and loose-fitting, tied with a string. Several rings of faceted gemstones in all colors glittered on his hands. On his head he felt the crown hug his temples, a circlet of leaves caught and lost in his dark curls. The gold slave bracelet, twin to the one on Laurent’s wrist, flashed. His fur boots were tied half-way up to his knees.

Voices stilled as he came into the room.

Laurent was at the center of a large group, but his body turned in reaction to the sudden lull.

Their eyes met.

Everything else went away, all the people, the palace, the fact that they ruled two kingdoms that had so recently been at each other’s throats. They saw only each other.

Damen went toward him.

Laurent turned away from the people he’d been speaking to. He seemed uncaring if he appeared rude. He moved toward Damen as if everything and everyone but the King of Akielos had been forgotten in the dark of the approaching night.

When they came together, they embraced lightly. Laurent raised himself up on his toes and kissed both sides of Damen’s face as was Veretian holiday custom. Together, they turned, hand in hand, and faced their court and over one hundred guests.

“The Yule is upon us.” Laurent’s voice rang through the hall, strong, always icy when he spoke to the masses, but with a charisma they could not resist.

“Haloea has arrived,” Damen followed, hearing the echo of his own rumbling tone against the walls.

Voices raised, they exclaimed together, “Let the feasting begin!”

A cheer went up. Quickly, people found their seats.

Laurent and Damen went to the middle of the highest table overlooking the entire room. As soon as they sat, tray after tray of delicacies were delivered to all the tables. Roasted meats and fowl, fresh bread still warm from the ovens, soft and hard cheeses, winter fruits of figs, apples, dried apricots, and nuts, and dozens of varieties of wines from the greatest of Akielon wineries.

Even Laurent drank of the wine when his usual preference was for water.

Plates of erotic cakes and cookies filled the tables.

As Damen and Laurent ate, entertainment came and went. There were dancers, lute players, jugglers, all more delightful than the last.

During an intermission, Laurent stopped eating though his plate was half-full. He turned to Damen. “I have a gift for you,” he said.

Damen stopped chewing. “You do?”

“Of course.” His hand came up from his lap and placed a small, wooden box, no bigger than Damen’s palm, beside his plate.

Damen swallowed, staring at his present. Then he looked at Laurent. The blue eyes sparkled. Laurent was resplendent in his king’s garb, his gold spike-crown sprinkled with sapphires, his long sleeves silver in the light, his beautiful fingers tapping at the table beside the present.

“Well?” Laurent asked.

“Thank you,” Damen said.

“No, I meant aren’t you going to open it?”

Damen nodded but made no move. “I have a present for you as well. But it’s in our rooms. It’s…it’s—“

“Well, now, I’ll open it later, then, won’t I?” The words sounded almost cold, but Laurent’s mouth flicked up in a half-smile, and his tone softened as he added, “Happy Haloea.” He spoke in Akielon, his inflections lilting and beautiful. In private their default language was Veretian, but Laurent told him soon after the coronation, “I am in your country now. In public I will speak your language.”

Damen picked up the box and slowly lifted the lid. Within was a beautiful pin large enough to be worn with a chiton. The pin had a starburst set with five diamonds at the points. Below it, as if wearing the starburst as a crown, was a lion’s head with ruby eyes. The entire pin was made of finest silver edged in gold.

The design was the perfect union of two important symbols from their respective countries. Damen felt an overwhelming surge of emotion. His throat closed.

“Well?” Laurent prompted.

Damen turned to him. “I—I—“ He blinked several times.

Laurent brushed a hand across Damen’s thigh under the table, a light, steadying gesture of support. “It’s all right. Don’t say anything.”

Damen took the pin from its cushion of silk, running his hands all around its smooth workmanship.

“Would you like to wear it?”

Still mute, Damen could only nod.

As Laurent stood, the guests in the hall all glanced up from their plates. Conversations stopped for a moment. The King of Vere took the pin from Damen’s palm and leaned toward his husband. He fastened it on the material just below Damen’s throat and above the vest. It glimmered brightest amongst all his other evening finery. Then Laurent, in front of everyone, leaned down, hands coming up to touch the sides of Damen’s face, and kissed him on the lips.

The hall applauded. Laurent sat back down without even glancing at the guests, picked up his fork and took a bite of his food as if nothing dramatic had occurred.

The guests took that as a signal and went back to their own feasting.

When Damen could speak, he asked, “Did you design this yourself?”

“Yes. I am not a jeweler, so I had help, but I made several initial drawings.”

“I am—I think—I don’t know what to say.”

“You’re welcome,” Laurent said dryly. But one eyebrow quirked up as he reached for his cup of wine. He swallowed, then added, “ _Sweetheart.”_

Now Damen smiled crookedly, almost sheepishly. The term of endearment meant something different for them than for most. It was a word they used as a sort of one-ups-man-ship because of the memories it brought from the first time they met. The memories were not the best, and the way they dealt with that was with their own brand of darker humor.

“Thank you,” Damen said, smile widening to a grin.

Laurent pretended not to hear him.

Damen put his hand to his throat and caressed the pin over and over. He had never seen anything more beautiful, except, of course, the King of Vere himself.

 

*

 

All through the evening, Damen kept touching the pin at his chest. His present for Laurent was nothing in comparison, but it was all he had. He both dreaded and anticipated the moment Laurent would open it.

At the very least, it was a book. And books were Laurent’s favorite gifts.

The great hall glittered and blazed with lights. The remains of the feast were being taken away by servants. Men were slowly filing away, drunk and happy, as darkness set early upon the land. They were headed down to the beaches to light the Haloea pyres, which would burn steady for hours against the backdrop of the bleak pewter sea.

Palace children ran through the halls shouting, glowing cheeks stuffed with Yule candy. They had taken to the combined Akielon and Veretian customs instantly. Damen noted how easily children were swayed to peaceful resolutions and friendship—especially if you offered them candy. He wished it were that easy in adulthood.

Slightly drunk, Damen still managed to make his way through the crowds and offer his greetings and best wishes for Haloea, the Solstice. Everyone admired his new pin. But the rule he’d made for the day—no discussion of politics—was honored. No one looked at the pin sidelong. No one protested the too quick merging of cultures that had been so recently at war.

Later, Laurent and Damen followed the snowy pathways to the beach, and stood on damp sand under a heavy black sky. They watched the pyres burn as the men, both Veretian and Akielon, shouted and danced.

Damen reached for Laurent’s hand. Their cloaks blew back in the bleak ash and salt-scented breeze. Their hair rippled.

Damen looked up, trying to find a star, any star, but the high dark clouds obscured them.

And where was the promised Wild Hunt that crossed the sky on fairy wings and ghostly flashes? The raven-men. The demons with their sleighs carved of bone. Witches riding owls. Horned gods galloping through the Zodiac in search of their own lost hearts. He had hoped to get a glimpse.

Laurent turned to him then. “I’m cold,” he said. “Let’s go home.”

Home. Laurent had never before referred to Ios in that way.

With his free hand, Damen touched the back of his lover’s head, a fleeting caress, the gold of the Veretian crown like ice against his skin. “Of course,” he said.

Hands still interlocked, they made their way through the flakes of snow and ash, toward the glowing white castle on the cliff.

 

*

 

As they passed through the entrance to their rooms, the hearth flickered bright and orange. The red and white covers of their bed overflowed like sunset-lit waves. When Damen saw the bed, his heart did a skip. He had almost forgotten his gift. The one he’d made for Laurent.

Suddenly, he had second thoughts. For a moment he had the idea that he might run to the bed, hide the gift, and pretend he had nothing ready for him yet, that Laurent’s Yule gift would arrive later.

But too quickly, Laurent let go of his hand and made his way straight for the bed, unclasping his cloak along the way. When he got to the bed, he immediately saw the cloth-covered present on his pillow.

Dropping his cloak to the floor, he said, “What’s this?”

Damen stood, frozen, by the door.

Laurent turned, squinting at him in question. “Is this for me?”

Damen nodded.

Immediately, Laurent began to unwrap it. When the book emerged from the cloth, Laurent studied it for a moment, then sank to the edge of the bed, head lowered, and ran his hands all over the cover. On it were apricot blossoms, and below them, a crossing of swords. Damen had not painted them, but had commissioned it to be done.

“What is this? I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Taking a deep breath, Damen stepped forward. “It’s my present. For you.” His face immediately began to heat as he watched Laurent turn to the first page.

“Ah, poetry. I love poetry.”

Teeth gritted at the word “poetry”—for surely that was not what his fumbling attempts ever deserved to be called—Damen approached him, hands held tight behind his back. “I am not as clever and eloquent as you. I used the same words too many times but I couldn’t think…beyond that, I mean. My barbarian idiocy is showing, I know.” Damen heard himself rambling, but couldn’t stop, not even when Laurent interrupted.

“You wrote these?”

“I also did the Veretian translations on the backs of each page.”

“But you—you wrote these? Yourself?”

 Damen groaned.“Yes, unfortunately. The scribe helped me make the sentences. He instructed me to make a list of sentences about you and about my thoughts of you. I wrote one sentence for each letter of the Akielon alphabet. The scribe gave me a title and I used the sentences from my list that corresponded to the letters in the title to make the poems. It’s a system for putting the lines together without too much thinking. So lines from poem to poem do repeat. They don’t really tell any tales, so they’re not really poems, I guess. They are just words, just thoughts, lined up according to the letters in the titles. It was a very stupid idea because I am not good with the words like you are. Now if it were the sword…”

Laurent closed the book again, and held it in his hand, turning it over and over. The gold-thread binding flared in the gentle candlelight. “Damen…”

“Honestly, the hearth is right there. You can look at the book, then throw it in.”

“Damen!”

“I know it would make me feel better to just watch it burn—“

“Hush!” Laurent jumped up and pushed his palm against Damen’s mouth. In his other hand he held the book, open again, staring at it. His lips moved. With a horrifying realization, Damen heard his own words come out of that beautiful mouth.

 

“ _Haloea_

_My stuttering heart_

_The end of months of pain_

_Eyes deeper than blue water_

_Nestled in our red bed_

_Starbursts light your way_

_The end of months of pain”_

Laurent looked up. “That’s—“

Damen laughed, stepping away from Laurent’s hand on his mouth. “It really doesn’t make sense. Don’t read anymore. Please!”

But when did Laurent ever do as Damen said?

He sat back on the bed and read, his voice filled with a gentle cadence of breathiness, and that lovely lilt he gave to every Akielon word.

 

_“Laurent_

_Eyes deeper than blue waters_

_The end of months of pain_

_My dreams are silver and wet_

_Fill my lungs with your breath_

_Starbursts light your way_

_I would shout your name_

_On this longest night”_

Damen laughed.

Laurent looked up at him, eyes strange, unreadable. “It’s not amusing, or silly, Damen.”

Damen shifted in his furred boots. Frowned.

Laurent lifted his hand to him. “Come here. Sit beside me.”

Hesitant, Damen finally sat.

Laurent turned the page. “This is your handwriting,” he said quietly.

Damen gulped. “Yes.”

“You wrote this.”

“I’m sor—“

“No!” Laurent turned to him. “Don’t apologize. Don’t deny it. This is you. And you gave it to me.”

“I—I—“

“Damen…Damen…”

“It’s not—“

Suddenly Laurent’s blue eyes darkened. The edges turned pink. “It’s the most beautiful gift I have ever received. It is. It simply—is.” On that last word, tears spilled, dotting Laurent’s cheeks.

Damen could not bear to see Laurent cry, ever. But this was different.

Sucking in his breath, Laurent said, as if he had not noticed his own tears, “I won’t read the rest if you really don’t want me to. But I am asking, may I?”

“You wish to?”

“With all my heart.”

“But it’s not good.”

“It is. Your words, they are good. They are wonderful. You just can’t see it because it is so personal. This is…breathtakingly beautiful.”

Damen smiled, wanting to reach out and dry Laurent’s cheeks. But he kept his hands in his lap. “It is yours to do with as you please. So, yes, you have permission to read it all.”

“Well, then.” He blinked, chest rising as he looked from the book to Damen. He leaned in and pulled Damen to him for a kiss. A long kiss. A deep kiss.

Damen felt the familiar flames begin to lick his skin, his veins, his heart.

When Laurent broke away, he let out a small laugh. “Good thing you didn’t give this to me in public. I would have made a spectacle of myself and lost all the ground I have gained here in the last few months.”

“A spectacle? You?”

Laurent smacked him on the chest, then rose. “Come with me by the fire. Let’s read this together.”

Damen stood, body aflame. But it wasn’t embarrassment now.

Their longest night was just beginning.

**Author's Note:**

> As far as Damen’s poems: I actually wrote sentences about Laurent and about Damen’s thoughts in a list form, all numbered from A to Z. Then I used the sentences that corresponded to the letters in the titles “Haloea” and “Laurent” to make the poems. So H (from Haloea) was the sentence: "My stuttering heart." A was: "The end of months of pain." And so on. I did a bunch of these poems but decided to go with the shorter ones for this story. Way back many many moons ago, I learned to do this from a college professor of poetry. It was a system devised to get the mind going and put together poems without really having to over-think them. For the English alphabet, you need 26 sentences or sentence fragments with a theme (such as love, or the holidays). It’s fun. Try it if you are so inclined.
> 
> Subscribe to my newsletter [here](http://eepurl.com/cqDVcX).
> 
> I write original fiction under the name Wendy Rathbone. Check out my [author page](https://www.amazon.com/Wendy-Rathbone/e/B00B0O9BMS/ref=dp_byline_cont_ebooks_1) on Amazon. I have a new winter holiday scifi tale in the anthology "This Wish Tonight" from Mischief Corner Books (also on Amazon) and two more brand new books: "The Coming of the Light: The Moonling Prince Book 2", and "Bitters", a collection of GLBTQ vampire stories. My newest collection of poetry, "Dead Starships", also just came out. Thank you so much for reading! I always reply to comments.


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